Graham
@grahamistearingup
Internet Culture, Media, and Politics. 📝Endless Yammering on Substack. 🎸 Used to have a band. 🎓MA in Communication & Culture.
Staring into portal to Hell only to see Lionel Hutz pitch a data centre in Burlington.
This guy is on Instagram, has ben profiled in NYT and all of he posts about is Iran and Israel. It’s incredibly annoying, but “afro-palestinians” is one of the biggest self-reports I’ve ever seen.
People are blaming Olivia Chow for the two shootings in Toronto this weekend, but she actually increased police funding by $93.8 million-almost like funding the police doesn’t actually prevent crime.
Margaret Qualley and Jack Antonoff have separated after three years of marriage
So many mulberries fell off the tree in the backyard was able to make a lil Jam!
Happy Canada Day. Pretty sweaty from the ride, but was nice to visit one of the Toronto’s heritage sites.
Someone commented on my Substack and I don’t wanna reply to it, but I still think it’s really funny.
In pursuing my MA in Communication and Culture, I looked at the subreddit to see what kind of discussions and values were emerging amongst the fan base, which involved coding and analyzing about 1700 comments.
While certainly unique, this isn't the first site to "monetize trolling," since all web platforms basically do that (especially the one we're on right now). I think of Fishtank as "trolling-as-technology," a subset of what Ryan Broderick has recently dubbed “Chudtech.”
One of the show’s T-shirts presents it contestants as getting harassed and tortured for “cheap laughs from a psychopathic audience,” which is half-true, since dealing with the harassment from the audience is part of competition. Only the strong survive the Tank.
After the first season had wrapped, the founders announced they made $1.25 million in revenue without the use of advertising or sponsors. In the time since, Stickermule has come on as an official merch partner.
Users can watch and interact with contestants by purchasing onsite tokens in exchange for TTS, SFX, or "Fishtoys." Over the show's 5 seasons, Fishtoys can be used to send a contestant a snack, a cigarette, or for $800 in tokens– have their bed removed for one night.
In each "season" of Fishtank, contestants are kept inside a house for 42 days and are eliminated one-by-one in a last-one-standing style competition, the entirety of which is broadcast 24/7 on the show's interactive web platform. fishtank . live (this is the Season 3 site)
I can appreciate the concerns raised here, but I think I’m stuck on this concept of how they seemingly want to see their political enemies prosecuted and imprisoned, but doesn’t want anyone to be happy about it. This does not inspire a lot of confidence that this will actually happen.
I literally wrote my master thesis on this. Will hopefully have something to post soon.